Dozing Off
by antidivinity
Summary: Harry ruminates on his life.
1. Chapter 1

It really is strange, that somehow after all this time Dumbledore is still haunting him. In a way. He is the one who says it: that death is just another adventure. Or something. He does not remember exactly, it really has been long.

He's still right about things. Harry doesn't miss the old man, but he does see him in a different way now after he's been gone. After a century.

Dumbledore is an eccentric old man, but his soul is everlastingly youthful. He has been through wars, betrayals, goodbyes, and a lifetime of bad decisions, but his eyes are still twinkling. He takes joy in little strange things. He's... positive, not defeated, for lack of better word.

Harry does not know how he does it.

Maybe a part of him dies with Tom. He has never been whole- the earliest part of his life is dedicated to the man, whether he likes it or not. His school days are vibrant, exhilarating. Dangerous. He does not know that when Tom dies it all turns into greys and blurs. A caricature of happiness. A marriage with his school crush, white picket fences, sons and daughters.

The Harry under the stairs' dream. A family. He has long been a different Harry. Even though his job is dangerous, it is not the same. It's not danger that he seeks. It is his life that he loses, the moment Tom dies.

He's been living in a daydream.

He looks down to his hands- his long fingers, the way his skin covers his muscles: strangely tight and supple, with no wrinkles.

The young woman sitting on the bench thinks that if this adventure is a gift, there are people who needs it more than him.

He drifts off to sleep.

"Mommy? Are you okay?" A small brown-haired boy wakes him from his light nap, tugging at his sleeves.

"Yes, Tsu-kun. Your mommy is just a little sleepy. Let's go back home."


	2. Chapter 2

His food tastes like sand.

His senses have been dulling, but it's the first time that he could not taste. The texture fills his mouth, and he remembers it from the faraway time when he once trips and eats a mouthful of it. Grainy, thick with dust that's getting sludge-like by the second where it touches his tongue.

He swallows it and goes to sip his tea. Still no taste.

He leaves the rice crackers in the kitchen drawer and his tea to the drain. He needs to teach his son how to cook, soon. One day his muscle memory will fail him, and his food will be different.

He peers into a nearby mirror, and a serene face greets him. It's rather pretty. Soft hair, soft eyes, delicate jawline. Harry is pretty, in a masculine kind of way, but he's full of sharp edges. Nana seems like a different creature altogether. It's too soft to be him, yet there is something there that makes him pause and think.

It's most likely his eyes. If there is something left of him, other than these thoughts of another life, it is the little soul looking through those eyes. He is not unfeeling, not yet empty... but just almost. Harry wonders if one day he will see the world in grayscale, or even turn blind. These days things keep slipping out of his reach.

Soft footsteps, almost like someone's trying to sneak in, reaches his ears. It's light, and there is a scuffling of shoes at the genkan. Harry smiles. "Welcome back, Tsu-kun. Any request for dinner?" He asks.

His small, fluffy-haired child bursts through the living room in a hurry and almost flies to the stairs. "An-anything's fine, mom!" The high-pitched voice of his child quivers; like he's trying to shout quietly and it's so hoarse. Harry squints at the figure running on the stairs and notices some redness on the knees, and a face hidden and muffled under a favoured orange jacket.

"Tsunayoshi?" The call of his name, with nothing attached, is enough to stop his son in his tracks.

"Please let mommy treat your knees."

Reluctantly, his son comes down. His eyes cast downward, refusing to meet his while Harry gently places him on the sofa.

When Harry kneels to see his face, Tsunayoshi's cheeks are damp and his eyes red, shining with tears. His neck, now that Harry tugs his jacket's hood down to see his face better... is blooming with bruises.

Finger-shaped bruises.

Suddenly his vision comes to clarity, and everything sharpens to a focus. There is a buzzing at the back of his eyes, and something trickles, and then gradually to a deluge fills up the void that is his heart. A familiar rage that has never happened after Sirius.

This is not a daydream, and Harry has woken up.

Yet as he blinks away the afterimages and glares from his vision, his heart lurches. He coughs up blood.


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Sorry about this, but the story's premise doesn't interest me much anymore. This chapter is to provide some closure since I don't like leaving a story unfinished. Thank you everyone who reviewed, followed and/or added this to their favourites.

* * *

It's sunny outside, and Harry could feel a smile tugging at his lips at the sight from outside the window. Children, or teenagers he should say, lounging under the shade and talking animatedly. And in the center of it all, bright like a thousand suns, is Tsuna.

He really has come a long way from the shy, nervous child that he was. Just the thought of him being hurt brings all sorts of ache to his chest; he truly regrets the first few years when he's dozing off. His absentness, correction, deadness, has cost his child a good chunk of his childhood.

Children aren't supposed to know violence. He remembers the bruises around Tsuna's neck vividly. Like a morbid photograph. And dozens of other wounds, from after that, he remembers them all. He is beyond glad that in the end, Tsuna is surrounded by steadfast friends. Guardians.

"This is where the contract ends, Master." A voice floats to his ears, and he smiles. His eyes never stray from the window, but he knows well who the figure hovering behind him is.

He sighs. "I never asked to live forever, you know. The whole 'killing my feelings to preserve my sanity' is uncalled for."

"You never change. After all these years... only you would willingly leave everything behind. Did you at least find what you're looking for, Master?"

Harry breathes, slowly, reigning in regrets and bitterness. He hasn't, and will never find it. It's gone for good, yet his heart longs for it still. "If only fate wasn't so cruel."

"Fate?"

"What I was looking for wasn't meant to be." Tom, Voldemort. His nemesis. And if he is allowed honesty... his only equal. They are, were, two sides of the same coin, light and shadow, yin and yang. They were so similar yet so different, and the magnetism of their enmity could have been something else entirely had Voldemort didn't practically murder his family and half of Wizarding Britain. Nothing short of time-traveling could salvage something like that.

He could almost hear the 'oh' as Death processes his answer.

"It's fine. It's not the only kind of love there is. In the end, I even learned how to properly raise at least a child of mine." He laughs. "I didn't appreciate it the first time, you know? I wanted a family. I got it. But it wasn't enough for me. I'm glad this time it's different. Tsuna is enough for me. I'm going to be the most horrible, overprotective mother there is, but I'll have this. I'll have this."

He could hear the rustling of cloth, and something cold pressing on his back. "You're going to be erased. Your memories as _Harry_. All of your existence, identity, Master! Why are you so-"

Harry laughs. Free, like he has never since all those years in a wondrous, magical castle. "Nana will still be there. Only I'm meant to go, right? She, he, I, will always keep watch over those children. It's enough for me."

Behind him, Death is radiating regret, guilt, and even fondness, and Harry thinks that he might be a little lonely, for a god. It must be why he's so reluctant to let him go; Harry must be the last person to ever be close enough to the being to be a friend, after Ignotus. But like all good friends, there are meetings and good-byes, and it's time for the latter.

Harry takes one last good look at the sunny lawn, and in one breath falls asleep, this time forever.


End file.
